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In music
Music

Music is an art form whose media is sound organized in time. Common elements of music are pitch , rhythm , dynamics , and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture ....
, a sixteenth note (American) or semiquaver (also occasionally demiquaver, British) is a note
Note

In music, the term note has two primary meanings: 1) a sign used in musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a sound; and 2) a pitched sound itself....
 played for one sixteenth the duration of a whole note
Whole note

In music, a whole note or semibreve is a note represented by a hollow oval note head, like a half note , and no note stem . Its length is typically equal to four beats in 4/4 time signature....
, hence the name.






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Sixteenth Notes and Rest
Sixteenth Note Run
In music
Music

Music is an art form whose media is sound organized in time. Common elements of music are pitch , rhythm , dynamics , and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture ....
, a sixteenth note (American) or semiquaver (also occasionally demiquaver, British) is a note
Note

In music, the term note has two primary meanings: 1) a sign used in musical notation to represent the relative duration and pitch of a sound; and 2) a pitched sound itself....
 played for one sixteenth the duration of a whole note
Whole note

In music, a whole note or semibreve is a note represented by a hollow oval note head, like a half note , and no note stem . Its length is typically equal to four beats in 4/4 time signature....
, hence the name. The semiquaver is half of a quaver which is an eighth note.

Sixteenth notes are notated with an oval, filled-in note head
Note head

In music, a note head is the oval part of a note. Noteheads may be coloured completely black or white, indicating the note value . In a whole note, the note head is the only component of the note....
 and a straight note stem with two flags. (see Figure 1). A similar symbol is the sixteenth rest (or semiquaver rest), which denotes a silence for the same duration. As with all notes with stems, sixteenth notes are drawn with stems to the right of the notehead, facing up, when they are below the middle line of the musical staff. When they are on or above the middle line, they are drawn with stems on the left of the note head, facing down. Flags are always on the right side of the stem, and curve to the right. On stems facing up, the flags start at the top and curve down; for downward facing stems, the flags start at the bottom of the stem and curve up. When multiple sixteenth notes or eighth note
Eighth note

An eighth note or a quaver is a Music note played for one eighth the duration of a whole note, hence the name.Eighth notes are notated with an oval, filled-in note head and a straight note stem with one flag ....
s (or thirty-second notes, etc.) are next to each other, the flags may be connected with a beam
Beam (music)

A beam in musical notation is a thick line frequently used to connect multiple consecutive eighth notes , or notes of shorter note value , and occasionally rests....
, like the notes in Figure 2. Note the similarities in notating sixteenth notes and eighth note
Eighth note

An eighth note or a quaver is a Music note played for one eighth the duration of a whole note, hence the name.Eighth notes are notated with an oval, filled-in note head and a straight note stem with one flag ....
s. Similar rules apply to smaller divisions such as thirty-second note
Thirty-second note

In music, a thirty-second note or demisemiquaver is a note played for 1/32 of the duration of a whole note . It lasts half as long as a sixteenth note and twice as long as a Sixty-fourth_note ....
s (demisemiquavers) and sixty-fourth note
Sixty-fourth note

In music notation, a sixty-fourth note or hemidemisemiquaver is a note played for 1/64 of the duration of a whole note . It lasts half as long as a thirty-second note ....
s (hemidemisemiquavers).

In Unicode
Unicode

Unicode is a computing industry standard allowing computers to consistently represent and manipulate Character expressed in most of the world's writing systems....
, U+266C is a pair of beamed semiquavers.

The note derives from the semifusa in mensural notation
Mensural notation

Mensural notation is the musical notation system which was used in European music from the later part of the 13th century until about 1600."Mensural" refers to the ability of this system to notate complex rhythms with great exactness and flexibility....
. However, semifusa also designates the modern sixty-fourth note in Spanish.

The names of this note (and rest) in European languages vary greatly:

Languagenote namerest name
German Sechzehntelnote Sechzehntelpause
French double-croche quart de soupir
Italian semicroma pausa di semicroma
Spanish semicorchea silencio de semicorchea
Portuguese semicolcheia pausa de semicolcheia

See also

  • whole note
    Whole note

    In music, a whole note or semibreve is a note represented by a hollow oval note head, like a half note , and no note stem . Its length is typically equal to four beats in 4/4 time signature....
  • half note
    Half note

    In music, a half note or minim is a note played for half the duration of a whole note and twice the duration of a quarter note . In time signatures with a denominator of 4, such as 4/4 or 3/4 time, the half note is two beat long....
  • quarter note
    Quarter note

    A quarter note or crotchet is a note played for one quarter of the duration of a whole note . Quarter notes are notated with a filled-in oval note head and a straight, flagless stem ....
  • eighth note
    Eighth note

    An eighth note or a quaver is a Music note played for one eighth the duration of a whole note, hence the name.Eighth notes are notated with an oval, filled-in note head and a straight note stem with one flag ....
  • thirty-second note
    Thirty-second note

    In music, a thirty-second note or demisemiquaver is a note played for 1/32 of the duration of a whole note . It lasts half as long as a sixteenth note and twice as long as a Sixty-fourth_note ....
  • musical notation
    Musical notation

    Music notation or musical notation is any system which represents aurally perceived music, through the use of written Modern musical symbols....
  • dotted note
    Dotted note

    In Western musical notation, a dotted note is a note with a small dot written after it. The dot adds a half as much again to the basic note's duration....
  • tuplet
    Tuplet

    In music a tuplet is any consecutive group of notes with an individual note value more or less than half as long as the next larger note value. This is usually indicated with a horizontal bracket with a number over a tuplet indicating how many notes of the same altered value are to be performed....
  • swung eighth